1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a multilayer capacitor, and more particularly, the present invention relates to a multilayer capacitor that can be advantageously used in a high frequency circuit. The invention also relates to an electronic device that is configured using the aforementioned multilayer capacitor.
2. Description of the Related Art
A multilayer capacitor that relates to the present invention is disclosed in, for example, Japanese Unexamined Utility Model Publication No. 49-127736. The multilayer capacitor disclosed therein has a structure that allows residual inductance to be reduced so as to be suitable for the use with high frequencies.
More specifically, the conventional multilayer capacitor has a rectangular capacitor body which has an overall dimension defined by a lengthwise dimension and a widthwise dimension that is smaller than the lengthwise dimension, and a heightwise dimension. End surface terminal electrodes are individually disposed on two end surfaces of the capacitor body. The end surfaces oppose each other and are individually defined by the widthwise dimension and the heightwise dimension of the capacitor body.
Also, a first inner electrode and a second inner electrode are provided in the capacitor body via dielectric layers. The first inner electrode extends so as to connect the two end surfaces of the capacitor body, thereby being electrically connected to the aforementioned end surface terminal electrodes at end sections thereof. On the other hand, the second inner electrode extends so as to connect two side surfaces, thereby being electrically connected to the aforementioned side surface terminal electrodes at end sections thereof.
Thus, the multilayer capacitor disclosed in the aforementioned publication has four terminal electrodes on two end surfaces and two side surfaces. Therefore, the residual inductance can be reduced to be less than the residual inductance in the case of a typical conventional multilayer capacitor that has only two terminal electrodes. However, electronic circuits that use the aforementioned multilayer capacitor having four terminal electrodes are still required to be used in higher frequency bands. To meet this requirement, the residual inductance, that is, equivalent serial inductance (ESL), must be reduced even more.